leone rx turbo help pls!!

[ashy_e04]

Hey guys,
was in the process of selling off vehicles to make way for my new toy...
and as you know cold weather + shitty battery = death to your ignition! So in my haste to get the car started, i chucked the battery from my other car in the rx. unfortunately my hasty efforts and the dodgy wiring (it was the tools not me dammit!) with a red stripe off the negative terminal, mean that i have now successfully made the suby more stationary than before and burnt something out. I'm not that experienced when it comes to electrics but know a thing or two and always try and fix things myself whenever possible...
so was wondering if anyone knows what might be the extent of the damage and how to fix it?

I've pulled the ecu out, and the circuit board shows no signs of heat etc. however when it happened i did notice some fumes/smoke coming up through the dash as i tried to start!!! I couldn't seem to find any fuses that were burnt out, and was wondering is there even a fuse for the computer? i wouldve thought there would be but all i could find was what appeared to be a bunch of switches leading into the ecu. Anyways, i know i've failed pretty miserably here so just in case someone would like to laugh at my expense i can understand that lol.

However any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated! I need to try and sell it soon to help the finances for my mates wrx
Thanks heaps in advance,
Eddy

[steptoe]

OHH NOOOO!!!! that smell - I got that from my GLTA L Series dash cluster warning lights and circuits in the back of it when my FL was broken, connecting, disconnecting power supply to all things great read my posts sept last year !

FL fusible link in brown box attached to water coolant reserve. The bloody corrode after 23 years, not burn out, corroded breaks and makes contact giving allegedly voltage spikes or and surge

I hear your problem , lost the bit about the black wire red stripe ??

Essentially IF i found broken FL a new one would have prevented my disater, now got no warning lights on dash for oil, doors, alternaot etc

[ashy_e04]

cheers steptoe for the quick reply!
sorry i wasnt very clear in my OP, i hooked the battery up the wrong way because the wires for the negative terminal have a red stripe on them (very annoying mod by a previous owner) and i was rushing to get it ready for what (was) a keen buyer... not paying enough attention and now i'm paying for that mistake
can't seem to figure out what exactly has burnt out but sounds like you had same smoke come up from the dash!
from what i gather with yours it was the fuseable link and/or alternator playing up?
i think my fl is ok i had a quick look before and didnt see anything obvious but will check again tomorrow just to make sure...
so you think replacing this might fix the problem but my instrument cluster etc. won't work?
am just hoping its not something too time consuming or expensive to fix. but is sounding like it'll be a bit worse than replacing a fuse lol

do you know what other areas i should look at also when you do something stoopid like hooking a battery up back to front?!!

thanks again for your help!

[Gannon]

I dare say you fried your ECU, plus possibly many other electronic devices.

Smell the ECU, you should be able to smell the burnt plastic smell.

So with the battery in the right way, what works?

Does the clock, radio ect work?

If you try to start the engine, what happens?

[steptoe]

I was sort of guessing you may have done that and forgotten to say in your desperation.

I wonder if fuses protected anything from this, it was only backwards , for how long before you disconnected. ind you, only an instant stuffs things

Everyone is gonna ask you what electrical works and not works. Cranking over now? Got any spark? Any fuel pump noise ? Any fuel delivery from filter hose CONNECT SPARK PLUG, PULL IGNITION FUSE FIRST FOR SAFETY. Some important yet common relays are sitting just above the middle of the ECU found when you pull it down from its nuts and studs. One is fuel pump, other is ignition. Dunno what hook up battery backward does to modern cars. A mate of my brother once did same with old V8 and got a funny growling noise when trying to start , hooked back up correctly and it was fine

[El_Freddo]

I'd say your alternator is fried at the very least. I did this when I was about 10 while jump starting dad's WB statesman, crossed the wires over, then it did something funny, lots of smoke and no go.

We had the alternator rebuilt, apparently it was on its last legs anyway and the old holden never ran better after that! We did miss out on rollerblading though...

Cheers

Bennie

[subarooster]

yeah unfortunately El Freddo is on the money there, Your alternator will have fried diodes now so i'd suggest either replacing it with one that you have lying around or have the current one repaired. As for the rest of it, its anyones guess as to what extent the damage is, Ecu might be alright but i'd b looking at the circuit board of your instrument cluster. Cars can pretty much be run in reverse polarioty except for diodes and transistors, instrument clusters are a pretty vulnerable point for it to fry so i'd be checking there first. Cheers, Tom

[ToyRX]

I hate to say it - but when I did this (fried the electrics - smoke, panic, smell, horror) I had to remove the dash and unwrap the loom of all its tape until I found some melted wires, took a long time but simple to fix once found and thankfully no ECU damage.
Dont give up - it is quite possable that you have simply super heated a wire in the loom and fried that.
Check your fuses, see what is blown. If you find some blown fuses the replace and turn on the ign to acc and see if the fuse blows, then turn to on, same thing, check if it blew, finaly try to start.
This process should help figure out if the ECU is involved or just acc/lights /fans etc